


in retrospect

by side_stickie_note (lost_stickie_note)



Series: tinysparks [10]
Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: A mention of bodyguard!Sehun, Angst, Implied/Referenced Character Death, M/M, Mafia!Chanyeol, Mourning, Unhappy Ending, mentions of killing, police!Baekhyun
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-08
Updated: 2020-08-08
Packaged: 2021-03-04 21:35:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25483273
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lost_stickie_note/pseuds/side_stickie_note
Summary: Chanyeol thinks of Baekhyun in past tense.
Relationships: Byun Baekhyun/Park Chanyeol
Series: tinysparks [10]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1734781
Comments: 16
Kudos: 37
Collections: Challenge #5 — Opposites Attract





	in retrospect

**Author's Note:**

> I wanted to write something sad, and this was the result. Included a few details in the end note.

Chanyeol always imagined that their love could survive anything-

Baekhyun had always been a lightning rod for trouble, a bit on the smaller side but scrappy and righteous, an insatiable well of morality set into the defiant tilt of his chin. And that is how Chanyeol had come to meet the other boy, himself whip-thin and too lean and gangly, arms and legs seemingly too much for the rest of his body at that age. Quiet, unassuming. And inexorably shunned for his family ties.

He never fought back.

Perhaps he should have, but Chanyeol doesn’t like ruminating on ‘what-ifs’. Maybe if he had, Baekhyun wouldn’t have come pinwheeling into his life one day, more than a head shorter than him at the time, top of his full height barely grazing his shoulder, full to the brim and chest puffed with the integrity of a world colored in black and white. Looking back, it’s an amusing scene, him awkwardly behind Baekhyun as the smaller boy had taken on Chanyeol’s bullies, offering him half of a chocolate bar afterwards making it clear that he, and by extension Chanyeol, wasn’t going to take their shit.

“Don’t you know who I am?”

“And so?”

Baekhyun’s shrug.

It's a good memory, and Chanyeol remembers it as such.

Chanyeol waits a moment before moving, fingers drumming against the plush leather of the backseat car interior, sighing as he does, accepting the umbrella from Sehun, the younger man’s brow slightly furrowed, the only giveaway to his concern. “Sir.”

Sehun’s gaze is imploring, but Chanyeol brushes it off. “You can wait here at the car, Sehun.” He gives the other man a wry smile, arm sweeping outwards to gesture at the empty cemetery, not another person in sight. “No one is around.” Chanyeol chuckles softly. “I am hardly in danger of being attacked here. At worst, rained on.”

“As you wish.” Sehun bows his head in a slight perfunctory nod.

The rain has been falling since the morning, and Chanyeol feels himself sinking into the ground, weight pushing the impression of his footprints into the wet grass, dead fallen leaves littered over the green. He makes his way towards the plot he wants carefully, weaving his path past the many others, his recollection not quite infallible, eyes scanning carefully for the proper tombstone. Ah. Three flowers, long stem cut, yellow roses. And Chanyeol places them gently on the top of the stone, the granite smooth and slick beneath his fingertips. He struggles with his umbrella for a moment, attempting to find a graceful way to kept it above his head and do what he wants to do.

There isn’t one.

He sighs, letting the umbrella fall to the side, paying no mind to his clothing, his hair already sticking to his forehead from the rain, coming down harder now, his knees digging into the grass, hands clasped together, closing his eyes.

Chanyeol hadn’t been surprised when Baekhyun had insisted on joining the police academy. That untempered righteousness. Maturity hadn’t whipped it out of him, every fiber of his being still thrumming with the energy from when they were younger. And Baekhyun had dragged him along to the shooting range for company, Chanyeol watching in amusement as Baekhyun, with his muff headphones, shoulders squared, legs firmly planted, for once in his life unsure of what he was doing.

“Need help?”

His hands over Baekhyun’s were warm, his arms wrapping up the other boy into an almost-intimate embrace, hold steadying Baekhyun’s aim.

What Chanyeol would come to find out, shooting straight into his heart.

It had been a slow descent, them. Falling into each other’s orbits like spinning planets that didn’t know how or when to stop. And then into each other’s beds. Until perhaps Chanyeol almost believes that maybe Baekhyun’s morality can stick to him too. But like Chanyeol says, Baekhyun had always been a magnet for trouble.

“This is the first time I’ve seen you here.”

Chanyeol opens his eyes slowly, the voice achingly familiar yet distant, words clipped and short, and he almost thinks he’s just imagined it, imagined Baekhyun’s voice. But when he looks up, the other man is there, fully in the flesh, hands shoved into the pockets of his long overcoat, the ends of his hair dripping.

“It’s been a while, Baekhyun.”

“Five years.”

“Five years to the day.”

He gets up slowly, knees protesting. “I saw Sehun.” A pause. “I hope this doesn’t mean we can expect any other company.”

“No, I would never.” Chanyeol swears. “Fuck, Baekhyun. Never, not here.”

“Good.”

Baekhyun doesn’t offer more.

Chanyeol had wanted to have a family first, adopting, but it’s Baekhyun who falls in love instantly, even with all his caution, the joy of the tiniest imaginable hand grasping at Baekhyun’s index finger driving his husband to tears. Happiness, pure and simple. And they had held it in their arms, rocked her to sleep as Baekhyun quietly sang into each night.

He should have been there.

A slipped moment, security detail lapse, Baekhyun’s panicked voice over the phone, and Chanyeol had driven himself, like a madman possessed, crossing the line into rival territory, hoping he wasn’t too late. He only made it in time to find Baekhyun alone, no more bullets left in his gun, eight rounds gone, seven more than needed.

And Chanyeol finds that sadness runs much deeper than their happiness could.

Perhaps it wasn’t enough, taking the lives of everyone responsible, a senseless violence to appease the anger within him, but Chanyeol did it anyways as Baekhyun looked on, silently. Judging, yet accepting. It had left Baekhyun empty, snuffed out any last vestige of hope that the world could be a moral place. That Chanyeol could make them a world worth living in.

She was only two.

Chanyeol had wanted to stay, to continue carving out a life together from everything they had already built, ready to try again and start life anew, pushing past the sorrow and bottomless regret.

-but Baekhyun didn’t.

**Author's Note:**

> Now go back and read just the first and last lines. :)
> 
> Three (3) yellow roses; one for him, one for Baekhyun, one for their lost child - a lost past.
> 
> ☂️🍂🌹
> 
> Twitter: [@sidestickienote](https://twitter.com/sidestickienote)  
> CuriousCat: [@sidestickienote](https://curiouscat.qa/sidestickienote)


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